BATTLE OF THE ATLANTIC: Lucky Thirteen

Thirteen torpedoed British
merchant seamen scrambled from their swamped lifeboat into a half-ship
they found floating in mid-Atlantic. They wolfed the canned chicken,
hardtack and liquor they found, but their "SS Stern" settled slowly.
When its deck was barely awash they had a farewell party They drank
their fill and hornpiped to the jangling tones of a portable
phonograph. None of them remembered much after that until a passing
ship picked them up.

Others were not so fortunate. Axis U-boats still scour the central
Atlantic in packs, trying to break up Allied...